August 14, 2004

System Calendar

Analysis of Business Days Required Between Fall/Spring, Spring/Summer and Summer/Fall

Process Sequencing Required: The tasks and processes that must be performed during the 15 business days between terms are itemized below. Most functions must be completed in the order stated, although there can be some overlap in processing. Each office typically needs the prior office to complete their processes before they can begin processing.

Maintaining Federal Financial Aid Compliance: In our current calendar structure there are no business days scheduled between Spring/Summer and Summer/Fall. This results in the processing of academic minimum progression (probation and suspension) and Financial Aid Satisfactory Progress after the next term has already begun. Students that are placed on suspension (whether academic and/or financial aid) who have already registered for the next term are enrolled even though they are on suspension status. Appeals are granted to academic suspension students through a petition to the Academic Vice President. Financial Aid suspension students must go through an individual appeals process for federal compliance requirements. The Spring/Summer and Summer/Fall are not equitable with what occurs between Fall and Spring. The number of business days required between terms to complete the necessary tasks and processes is the same for Fall/Spring, Spring/Summer, and Summer/Fall.

Zero Contingency: Please note that overnight processing is still built into this business day plan in order for all processing to occur within fifteen business days .The above business day plan will only result in all tasks being completed if there are no hardware/software problems and no serious illness or emergency occurs to critical student services staff. There is zero contingency built into this plan.

Fifteen Business Days: The following delineates the distribution of the business days required:

3 days – required for instructors to record grades on WebAdvisor or to

report grades to the Registrar (BOR Policy 2:6)

3 days* – Registrars enter/edit/verify final grades

  • Edit for grades not reported by faculty and contact faculty to submit these grades
  • Enter grades not recorded by instructors on WebAdvisor
  • Edit that faculty entered the appropriate/valid grades allowed and contact faculty to correct.
  • Edit that the Last Day of Academic Activity was entered for F, U, RU grades and contact faculty to correct.
  • Edit that the expiration date was entered for undergraduate incomplete grades and contact faculty to correct.
  • Run BGVU (to verify final grades).

*Requires enhancements to be made to WebAdvisor that will remove the need for some of the manual edits listed above. To facilitate the completion of these processes, universities should supply additional faculty grading training.

Overnight + 1 day + Overnight (Central Processing by RIS, processing by Registrars and Financial Aid)

  • System Data Administrator runs CACS (determines students who are on academic Probation and Suspension at the end of the term) in Audit Mode (3 hours)
  • CACS edited by Registrars (6 hours)
  • System Data Administrator runs CACS in Update Mode – (3 hours)
  • Paragraphs run by System Data Administrator to create saved lists for use by universities in sending probation and suspended letters to students.
  • System Data Administrator runs XIBU (Updates Home Location) – 3 hours
  • Financial Aid runs Satisfactory Academic Progress; reviews aid probation students and suspended students not meeting the standards (4 hours).

3 days – Financial aid processing for all students including home location changes,

moving students from local to combined (commitment), and other eligibility

criteria.

  • Review EFT (Electronic Funds Transfer) Roster for hold and release.
  • Process adjustments for system transfer students (students transferring within the Regental System) for budgeting, awarding, and reporting (Federal Pell and Federal Loan entities, National Student Loan Data System, etc.)
  • Apply eligible financial aid including EFT disbursements.
  • Process the first running of XATR (Financial Aid Transmittal) and sending the results to Accounts Receivable for XATP (Posting aid to billing statement) -12+ hours
  • Manually change aid for exceptions (consortium agreements, study abroad, correspondence review, etc).
  • Final run of XATR and XATP (10+ hours) to update information.
  • Continue aid review for late students (commitment, move)

5 days – Business Office Processing

  • Initial run of XFVR (generates a list of “potential refunds”) - 8+hours
  • Refund lists reviewed for accuracy
  • Final run of XFVR and XFVC (posts refunds to student accounts) – 8+hours
  • FTP files to FIS (FIS runs daily cycle overnight)
  • Refund checks printed, signed, and separated.
  • Statements run (XRST or ARSP) – 10+ hours
  • Statements printed and assembled.

Overnight – RIS - System Data Administrator Processing

  • Run Pending Address Update (PADU)
  • Run Recalculate Term Standing (RTSL) – 2 hours
  • Run Class Level Update (CLUP) – 4 hours
  • Run Email keep posted (XCDE) – ½ hour

Additional Information - Business Days Required

If fifteen business days are not considered and we maintain the current 10 business days for Fall/Spring and 0 business days for Spring/Summer and Summer/Fall, the following sacrifices will be the result:

  1. Inaccurate Data: Colleague processes will be run but most edits/queries will not be run and then resolved by university personnel, resulting in inaccurate or incomplete data that will provide less than ideal student services and could result in compliance, financial, and legal issues.
  1. Adversely affect some student populations: There would be no (or minimal) processing time to process mid-term transfer students which requires a considerable workload and coordination between the respective universities. There would be inaccurate or late financial aid to these students. Late processing will affect off campus students that rely on the US Mail to receive “refund” checks to pay obligations other than tuition and fees. Notification to students of probation or suspension standing will occur very late or “after the fact” – after they have already enrolled for the subsequent term.
  1. Staff overtime efforts: To meet the current fall to spring schedule, staff members are required to work holidays and holiday weekends as well as evenings. When these are weeks that include holidays, staff, that are overtime eligible, are not compensated at time and a half.
  1. Contingency plans: Even the fifteen business day recommendation contains zero contingency. However, in the case of an emergency, overnight and weekend processing could be used to meet the processing requirements to begin a new term. If we return to the 10, 0, 0 business days, where extensive overnight and weekend processing is required just to get the job done, then we have no time to meet the processing needs in the case of a hardware, software, or human emergency. The term start up could be delayed.
  1. Faculty grading: A shorter than three day grading period could encourage faculty to not give subjective exams in order to meet the reduced grading deadline. Faculty would be held totally responsible for grading completed. Very few administrative edits would be processed resulting in increased grading errors.
  1. Audit vs. Update Processing: Processes such as CACS (that determines probation and suspension) would not be run in audit mode which permits editing to occur. These processes would only be run in update mode increasing data errors.
  1. Federal Financial Aid Compliance Issues: Financial aid satisfactory progress appeal considerations could occur after students are already enrolled in the term or planning to enroll. Also an insufficient break in enrollment does not permit time to evaluate students with all “failing” grades in the previous term (required for the Return to Title IV). Inadequate processing and editing time could increase the potential of disbursement of financial aid to ineligible students creating a significant financial liability and increased workload, as well as negative public relations.